It was a pity that I still hadn't learned how to remove emotional pain with ancient magic. As our experiments continued, I could feel Sebastian's anxiety growing by the day.
To our chagrin we'd hit a bit of a wall regarding his relic - after upscaling the test subjects from rats to Doxies, the curse would only be partially dispelled upon reading the incantation, while the sacrificial subject wound up maimed in some fashion. It was almost like something invisible had clawed and ripped at it within the span of a second, and the doxy would be suddenly missing limbs, have huge gashes in its body or even become disemboweled. While we did what we could to heal and restore them before setting them free, not wanting to use their sampled life forces in further tests, a quick death was mercifully granted with a burst of ancient magic if the damage was too severe.
We had also come to a disagreement about the particular translation of one of the final passages in Slytherin's spellbook about the relic. A couple of the words had faded and blurred over the centuries, to the point that we just couldn't be sure what it originally said, and even our best restorative charms did little to make it any clearer. Sebastian was positive the sentence fragment meant "reverse the curses of life", which, given the context of the rest of the sentence, could possibly mean that the relic would reverse all curses, including those inflicted by Dark magic.
However, I felt the curves of the faded letters formed different shapes than he thought. If I understood them correctly, then the fragment and sentence together translated to mean "reverse the curse of death". Unfortunately, that would mean the relic wasn't actually what we thought it was, and could theoretically only do one thing, except... well, you couldn't reverse death. It just wasn't possible. All you could do was turn the dead into the undead, or apparently Thestrals if you were a pony. But it was also entirely possible that I was reading it wrong - he had far more experience translating old human languages than I did, after all.
Either way, we simply weren't making the progress either of us hoped. In case we'd somehow overlooked another method that might cure Anne faster, I set to researching other options once we'd run out of doxies while Sebastian went out to hunt down some Gnomes we could use next.
The alchemy book I'd taken from the scriptorium also promised a formula to create a Philosopher's Stone - which could then be used to create a cure for absolutely anything. But upon reading said formula I found it sorely lacking in accuracy - it made no mention of the integral substances Nigredo, Albedo, Citrinitas or Rubedo, recommended using an earthen pot which would explode upon the creation of Citrinitas and ruin the whole batch, and the test to see whether the substance that was supposed to be Rubedo was finished boiling was backwards. I skimmed through the rest of the book for any mention of Azoth, Alkahest or Panacea, and promptly tossed it away when I found none. Any other books from the school library, Restricted section or not, offered little more information than that, and my own knowledge from Equestria could only fill in so many gaps.
No... that Flamel guy's the only one who ever managed to unlock the secret of creating a Philosopher's Stone. And I doubt he'd be willing to share his notes on how he did it, no matter who asked. Not when it allowed one to create an elixir that effectively granted immortality.
Ah, now that was a lofty goal for a truly insane mind to accomplish. I'd considered the steps to becoming immortal before - sure, it might be fun at first... until the universe eventually achieved total entropy, bringing heat death and the death of any interesting speck of life along with it, and entirely ceased to exist. And that alone would take an incomprehensible amount of time; if one waited long enough then they'd eventually see another big bang and the universe born anew, and then they could become the god of an eventual civilization... but I think I'd lose my mind by the time I'd seen the last of the infinite void of black holes burn themselves out. Part of me felt sorry for my former mentor because of that, in a way.
I continued my search.
...
...
...
Unicorn blood? No, that'd just leave her with an additional curse. It's not her life we're trying to save, anyway, she's not actively dying... not yet, at least. Hopefully it'd stay that way, the data I'd taken from her diagnostic charm had suggested that she was stable for now.
Although I had once been certain an Umbrum Crystal would suppress the curse within her without any ill effects. I just couldn't be sure about anything anymore.
...
...
...
Hmm... maybe the arcano-religious field of Demonology could cure her? When Sebastian returned from his excursion with a sack full of gnomes, I asked him if he'd looked into it. Understandably it was near the bottom of his "last resort" list, so he hadn't gotten around to it quite yet. After letting the gnomes run free into the Vivarium I began some preliminary research and preparations.
After a day of study we had a working plan. Even though he was certainly the most powerful and able, we decided not to summon Jamaz the Infernal King, for fear of what could happen if we happened to get the ritual wrong. A lesser demon would do just fine for one person, and after a bit more reading we settled on the perfect one to beseech. Yconaababur was still a horrifyingly powerful entity, known for his hot, hasty nature, but he was also known for his strength and generosity. He was said to have total power over decay, either staving it off entirely or reversing its effects... though he could also cause death at will, and if he decided to kill one or both of us on a whim... well, that wouldn't be good.
First we exited my Room so we could both focus on a place we could summon this demon as safely as possible. After a few moments the Room of Requirement spawned a thick metal door covered in protective runes, so heavy that it took the both of us to push it open and shut again. Inside the room, it was completely barren except for a table off to the side containing all of the ritual items we would need. The stone walls and ceiling were covered in more protective runes, both etched into the surface and painted over those in... well, someone or something's blood.
After reading the incantations and working out the proper pronunciations, we set to preparing the ritual. The ceremonial Wand of Solomon the Room provided us would have to do, as making our own would take at least two weeks, not to mention neither of us were particularly excited about sacrificing a live goat. We carefully constructed the magic circle to the letter of the texts, nailing the provided goatskin to the floor with nails from the casket of a recently-dead child, then using a bloodstone to scratch shapes and letters into the floor around it. We set a candle and a garland of verbena each to the left and right of the circle, then lit them and set out a vase full of willow ash in front. To my surprise an Incendio lit the ashes on fire easily; so far our preparations were working. After carefully adding a mixture of Spirit of Water, incense and camphor to the vase, we readied our Galleons and Sickles wrapped in parchment in case anything went wrong, and Sebastian began to speak the long, complicated incantation.
Nothing had happened by the time he finished it, requiring him to stick the ends of the wand into the vase's fire and read a secondary incantation that rattled off the names of numerous angels before eventually devolving into a string of letters. Once he'd reached the fifteenth "C" in the speech, the fires suddenly extinguished themselves.
And then the vase exploded in a blast far more potent than we ever expected; I just barely got a nonverbal Protego off in time to prevent it from cutting or singeing our faces. The wooden floors spontaneously burst into dark red flames that somehow didn't burn and consume them, leaving only the circle we were in safe and untouched. But despite the protections of the circle the room quickly became uncomfortably warm, and we edged closer together for safety as something materialized from the center of the flames, rising and standing slowly.
It looked strangely human for a demon, minus its skin made of blazing yellow fire. Heat shimmered off its body like a mirage, distorting its sadistic grin and gleaming eyes. Sebastian and I shared bewildered glances with each other as Yconaababur quickly bellowed out a monologue in its deep, guttural voice.
"Late is the plea of the penitent. I will bathe in the blood of the righteous. All will burn in the company of sin. My coming shall herald glorious sorrow. I will claim the flesh of man for my own. Three houses in the halls of hell, two legions in the glory of my house, one to usher tribulation."
...
...
...
"I HAVE COME-"
I blasted it with ancient magic before it could utter another word. The demon howled in pain as the magic tore it apart from the inside out and burned its flesh into ash, banishing it back to whence it came. The ashes sank into the floor and vanished, along with the flames.
A few beats of silence passed.
"I... don't believe that's going to work..." Sebastian winced fearfully. That was a little too Dark for our liking. I swallowed my wildly-beating heart back into my chest.
"Yea... no. Pass me the salt and holy water."
~
After changing the Room back into mine we piled together every single book we had that could possibly contain the cure for Anne's curse. Out of all of them, there were maybe only half a dozen that both of us hadn't read cover to cover. The rest of the day was spent quietly reading through those books.
I had finished one and was halfway through my second when Sebastian suddenly shouted. "Sunset, look at this!" he said as he waved me over. Glancing over his shoulder at what he was reading, I could see he was in the middle of a thick old tome called Magick Moste Evile.
"What'd you find?" Excitedly he pointed to a passage at the bottom of the current page.
"Look... these horcruxes offer a way to return to life after death, even after one's body has been entirely destroyed! Perhaps there's something to be learned from this ritual!" I quickly skimmed through the paragraphs... and quickly found quite a few problems we'd run into if we tried.
"...No," I sighed, shaking my head. "There might be something in there, but it's far too specific to pick apart and find it anytime soon. And while the ritual itself might work, the steps we'd have to take to make it happen would be practically impossible."
"What? What do you mean?" he asked.
"Well," I began counting on my fingers. "...First, we'd have to get Anne to somehow willingly murder someone in cold blood - Imperioing her into doing it wouldn't count. And she'd have to do so while Legilimensing into their mind, then she'd have to quickly put the piece of her soul into whatever receptable she chose before it decays and becomes useless. Then we'd have to create a homunculus and have it within five feet of her when she dies, kill her and destroy her body-"
"What?! We are not killing Anne!" Sebastian recoiled in horror, though after a few seconds he calmed back down, then sighed as he pinched the bridge of his nose. "Alright, alright... when you put it that way, it does sound ridiculous."
"It didn't before?" I blinked.
"I'm desperate!" he yelled as he threw out his hands. "We've been at this for weeks and we're no closer to a cure!"
"I know... and it'll probably take even more weeks of searching to find one," I frowned in sympathy. "I just can't believe it's taking this long, we should've found something by now." When he didn't respond immediately I glanced down at him, my heart aching to see him burying his face in his hands.
"...What if there really isn't a cure for her?" his voice began to tremble. "What if we're doing all of this for nothing? What... W-What if I can't help her...?"
"There is, and we will find it," I affirmed as I almost instinctively laid a hand on his back. "I know it's out there somewhere."
"What makes you so sure...?" he replied weakly after a few moments. I sighed again as I felt a dark, dense fog of fear, failure and despair coiling around his heart, choking out the light of optimism that usually shined so brightly within him. For some reason, something Celestia had told me long ago echoed within my mind.
"...The truly beautiful thing about magic, is that it has no limits to what it can do," I mumbled quietly as I knelt down and leaned my head on his shoulder, my hand moving to grasp his other. "That's what Celestia always told me, anyway." I felt him shift in his seat, his shoulders heaving once.
"Could... could she cure Anne's curse?" he asked slowly, hopefully. In the back of my mind, I wondered the same - it certainly couldn't be out of the question entirely, I knew she would try her hardest to help anyone who needed her.
But... going back felt impossible now. Taking both Sebastian and Anne with me to Equestria would raise so many questions... it wasn't what I'd done that I was worried about, nor was I worried that they'd be welcomed with anything less than open forehooves, but rather what their reactions would be to a world, a universe so vastly different from their own. Equestria was nothing like Earth, this human world. And a small part of me even feared what Sebastian would think if he ever saw me as I truly was... And that was if the mirror didn't turn them into ponies like it had turned me into a human. Who knows how well or how poorly they'd cope with that? The more I thought about it, the more I felt deeply uncomfortable with that idea.
No... that's gonna have to be my own last resort. "...I don't think so." He sighed, his shoulders heaving again.
"...Damn it."
"I'm sorry," I murmured sincerely, sighing as well. It wasn't of much comfort to feel him place his hand over mine.
~
We diligently continued our research every day after classes, as fruitless as it seemed to be. On Wednesday I was offered a break in the form of Natty and Poppy joining us at the Slytherin table during dinner - the latter had come up with a plan to ask the centaurs for help in finding and protecting the Golden Snidgets. At first Sebastian was less than thrilled at the news, half worried for my safety and half anxious to get back to our work, but I managed to convince Ominis to take him out on a last-minute outing to Hogsmeade instead. He could use the break to help take his mind off of everything, to which he begrudgingly agreed.
We were to leave at 11pm to avoid detection, which meant skipping Astronomy. It was fine with me, as I'd come to find Professor Shah's tone of voice supremely aggravating, not to mention I'd also discovered she was quite the hypocrite; divination through studying the stars and planets was just as baseless as actual Divination, if not more so. Regardless, I handed Sebastian my essay to turn in for me (two and a half feet of parchment detailing the significance of Jupiter's four largest moons in the subject that had quickly morphed into ten feet both regurgitating her teachings and debunking them) and milled about, practicing some defensive spells until it was time to leave.
The three of us flew deep into the Forbidden Forest, deep into centaur territory. We circled around a few times, hoping that those of them stargazing on this frigid, clear night would see us and alert the others. Despite the warming weather, this part of the forest was still half-covered in white.
"I can do this... I can do this," Poppy whispered to herself, psyching herself up. "They will want to help." We landed in a small clearing where the day's sunlight just barely reached the old, packed snow between the trees. Glowing lacewing flies lazily floated among the evergreen branches, offering a little light. We stood there for a few moments, eyeing our surroundings and casting Warming Charms on our cloaks to keep out the cold.
"So, is this where we're meeting the centaurs?" I asked.
"Well... they don't exactly... know we're coming," Poppy admitted, smiling sheepishly as Natty and I both shrieked. "So it's less of a meeting and more of a... surprise, I suppose?"
"Oh... they will not like this at all," Natty shook her head, her eyes wide with fear. "They may think we're plotting against them rather than asking for their assistance."
"I hope these Snidget things are really important to them," I groused, my body suddenly tensing at every little noise I heard around us. I was already half-expecting a barrage of arrows to come flying out of the bushes at us at any time.
"They are," Poppy affirmed, nodding. "Perhaps they'll be able to tell that we're sincere. There's something about them that's so... knowing. It's almost unnerving."
"I... I-I suppose they are known for having an air of omniscience about them," sighed Natty, glancing over to me. I could only offer a shrug; centaurs were largely just a myth back in Equestria. I had no pertinent insights to share.
"That's exactly the right word! I just-" Suddenly Poppy's cheerful expression fell, and her eyes turned down to the ground. "...Never mind."
"You sure?" I found myself asking out loud before thinking it through. Someone's expression didn't just change as quickly as that if it was nothing.
"It's nothing, truly," she waved away. "I've- ...we've no secrets to hide." To that statement both Natty and I glanced away nervously; Natty likely for the secrets she kept from her mother about our activities, and myself because of my true nature, the fact that I was really a pony in human guise.
"...Right," Natty breathed out after a few moments. "We will simply be honest with them about our intentions. They will have to help us! ...Won't they?"
"Yes, of course," Poppy nodded, sharing an uneasy look with her. "You're absolutely right. We'll meet with them, tell them about the Snidgets and I'm sure it'll all be-"
She cut off her sentence when I suddenly whipped around, feeling the vibrations of hoofsteps in the ground, quickly advancing towards us. A few seconds later we were surrounded, the centaurs galloping around us in a circle as if herding us together. Out of the corner of my eye I could see that Natty was very nervous, but Poppy was watching them with the same foolish, entranced awe as she had with the dragon. She did, however, have enough sense to clasp her hands around Natty's when she saw she was edging towards casting a defensive spell.
The centaurs slowed their pace, arrows nocked on their bows in case we moved too quickly. One of them approached us, streaks of white in his dreaded hair and beard and a deep scowl on his face. "What do you think you're doing here, humans?" he growled.
Poppy quickly stepped forward. "Please, we were hoping to speak with you-"
"Ah... I suppose you'd like a tale for your friends of the time you spoke to a centaur, and 'it' spoke back," he interrupted with a sneer, narrowed eyes glancing around to the others. All of them seemed to share his sentiments.
"No, never! We're here because we need your help!" she pleaded.
"Enough!" the centaur threw out his hand, and at the gesture the others raised their weapons towards us. "You made a grave error in judgment in coming here, little witch."
"Put those down, or it'll be you who've made the grave error," I warned, stomping my feet as I adopted a stern pose. It didn't bother me when the bows and arrows swiveled to point in my direction, with my hand on my wand and ancient magic charged up it'd take only a swish to knock them all out of their hands.
"You dare threaten us?!" the centaur bristled. "You who mocks our mannerisms, you who would encroach on our lands?"
"Only if you prove yourselves not as wise as we thought and attack us," I snorted. "You'd do well to listen to my friend's pleas." Friend...? I think of her as my friend, too...? Whether through my threats or reasoning, the centaur hesitated long enough for another to approach, this one appearing much older than the rest. His neatly-groomed grey hair was pulled back into a ponytail (heh), his face was a maze of wrinkles and age lines, and the fur of his equine body was a dappled white.
"Leave them be, Elek," he spoke. "We do not harm the young. It is not our way."
"You forget your place, old fool," Elek hissed. "I am the leader of this herd, and while you cling to 'our way', their kind continues to slaughter beasts like us without a care!"
The elder centaur regarded us for a moment, his calm demeanor never changing. "...From what I can see, they have slaughtered no one. They will leave here unharmed," he subtly emphasized. Elek grimaced as the other centaurs lowered their weapons and nodded slightly in agreement.
"...Mark my words, Dorran," he glared. "If I ever see them again, it will be all four of your heads." With that he stormed away, the rest of the herd following after him. Once they had left, Dorran sighed and shook his head at us.
"Foolish children... do you know what happens to witches who wander here?" he chastised as he started walking in the direction of Hogwarts. "Now follow me before-"
"Golden Snidgets are still alive and the poachers are after them!" Poppy shouted all at once, unable to hold back any longer. When she saw that Dorran hadn't stopped walking or even seemed like he'd heard her, she continued. "They know that the key to finding them lies in the moonlight, but they don't know what that means... yet! Please... help us find the Snidgets before the poachers do!"
Dorran finally stopped moving, and stared off into the distance. "Could it be...?" I barely heard him mutter before he turned back towards us. "In the south, there is a cave within which lies what the poachers seek: a moonstone. Retrieve it, and place it in the henge in the forest."
All three of us blinked in astonishment. Was it really this easy? Or was this some kind of trap...?
"I, on the other hand, must go speak with the herd. Find me after you have done this." And with those instructions he turned back around and trotted away, leaving the three of us in stunned silence.
"...I don't understand," Natty finally breathed.
"So the moonlight mentioned in the journal doesn't refer to actual moonlight, but to a moonstone..." hummed Poppy, deep in thought. "What do moonstones have to do with Snidgets?"
"And why was he so certain about where we could find one?" I pressed my lips together. "I don't know if I like the sound of this... he was awfully forthcoming with that information."
"Knowing centaurs, I suspect he's referring to a specific moonstone," said Poppy. "We'll likely know it when we see it."
"That, or we'll wind up dead somehow," I grumbled under my breath.
"I just can't believe it... at least one of the centaurs wishes to help us," Natty shook her head. "It's a shame how quickly he left... what was his name? Dorran?"
"Seems to be," I nodded.
"Well, if Dorran knows something we don't, I'd rather act now and ask questions later," said Poppy. "I can head to the library and start looking into the cave he mentioned."
"I'll help you," offered Natty. "Far less stimulating than sneaking out of class and meeting with centaurs, but still quite enjoyable."
"But I thought you Gryffindors liked doing such brave, stupid things," I smirked, Natty smiling back.
"True, but there is a difference between a foolish endeavor and a suicidal one... I would have tried leaving a letter out in the forest first," she raised an eyebrow as she stared pointedly at Poppy. The little Hufflepuff girl simply rubbed the back of her head and giggled.
"...Maybe that would have been a good idea," she admitted.
"Ah, what's done is done," Natty sighed with a slight grin. "I have to admit, I am surprised you aren't a Gryffindor as well."
"I think the Hat did consider it back then, when I was being Sorted," Poppy replied, thinking. "Anyway, what about you, Sunset?" I inhaled sharply, though tried my best to downplay it. As much as I enjoyed combing through the school library for books that might've had something interesting within them...
...I didn't really have the time to spare at the moment. Not when my best friend needed me. I made him a promise, and I intended to keep it. "I'll try to help, but I can't make any promises... I need to study for the OWLs."
"But you already have the highest marks in all the classes we share," Natty argued gently. "I don't think you'll have anything to worry about when it's time to take them." Inwardly I winced, because she was right... though to be fair, in any class I didn't have the best grades in, I was a close second. Sebastian was my only competition.
"That's just this year's studies, though... OWLs are cumulative, and I've only been here the one year," I white-lied. "I want to make sure I haven't overlooked anything from the past years."
"Hm... I guess you do have a point," she admitted slowly.
"It's alright," Poppy smiled mischievously, edging closer to Natty. "We can search together." Natty caught her smile and copied it after a moment, seemingly understanding the hidden meaning beneath.
"See? You two won't even miss me," I grinned. "...If you two would like to take a 'break' during your search, almost nobody ever goes into the nook in the southeast corner of the second floor."
"I see. Do you speak from... personal experience?" Natty smirked as Poppy snickered, barely able to get her words out.
"Sallow and Shimmer, sitting in a tree! K-I-S-S-I-N-"
"Wha- no!" I grumbled, cutting off her childish song. "We're not that kind of friends! ...Not yet, anyway," I muttered under my breath, glancing away.
"Ah, but you're blushing!" pointed Natty, and she and Poppy burst into proper laughter. My mouth scrunched into a frown as I clapped my hands over my cheeks.
"...Why am I friends with you two again?"
~
It was well past midnight by the time we returned to Hogwarts. I went straight to my Room, looking forward to going to bed but jumping in surprise to see Sebastian there. He was reading through Slytherin's spellbook once again, muttering to himself so quietly I couldn't make out what he was saying. And evidently he was so focused on his reading that he didn't notice me returning.
"What are you doing here?" I asked, causing him to shout and jolt in his seat.
"...I couldn't focus," he admitted after calming himself. "I handed in our homework and asked Shah to be dismissed, I wasn't feeling very well." I sighed, frowning in sympathy from the emotions churning within him.
"Did going out with Ominis help any?" He shook his head slowly.
"Not even after a Butterbeer or two. Everything we talked about just reminded me of Anne." A pause to sigh bitterly. "...I feel like I'm failing her."
"You're not, Seb," I reassured softly. A sudden, chilling thought drifted into my mind. "Uh... You're not studying the relic on your own, right?"
"Don't worry, it's still tucked away in my desk," he replied. Searching his feelings confirmed that this was a lie; I cleared my throat as I raised an eyebrow, crossing my arms. With another sigh he reached into his pocket dimension and set the relic on the Potions table next to the spellbook's lectern. "Alright, I did consider it... but I remembered what you've told me about studying such Dark magic and didn't go through with it. I promise." This time he wasn't hiding a lie, or even thinking about trying. It was good to know he had ultimately taken my repeated warnings seriously.
And it wasn't like I could blame him for thinking about it. "Well, that's good, at least," I remarked, coming closer.
"Sorry."
"Don't be... well, don't do it again, anyway, but... I understand." I glanced over the pages, finding him reading the passage we disagreed upon once again.
I desperately hoped that my interpretation of the words was wrong. After a few moments of uncomfortable silence I gently placed a hand on his shoulder, blinking at the sudden pang of pain I felt as he looked up at me with miserable eyes.
"Look, it's late," I grimaced. "Try to get some sleep, okay? We'll keep working on it tomorrow. I know how important this is to you, but it won't help if we're both so tired we screw up what might be the most important experiment yet." He sighed once again, though it morphed into a yawn as he stood up and stretched.
"You're right... very well." He stood there for a few seconds, eyes glazed over as though he were too exhausted to even think. I tilted my head as I waited to see him move again, then suddenly my vision filled with him.
He covered his eyes with my shoulder as he slumped against me and held me tight. Even without speaking I could sense there were words he wanted to say but they just wouldn't come out, or rather, he refused to let them out. The cold fog of helplessness and despair around him seemed thicker, his body shivering against mine.
I said nothing as I wrapped my arms around his back, simply holding him for as long as he wanted, for lack of knowing what else to do. In the depths of my heart I cursed the Keepers and their lack of useful knowledge, or their refusal to give it to me.
I hated knowing he felt so hopeless and discouraged... and I wanted nothing more than to take this pain away from him.